


Trenchcoat Angel

by whichstiel



Series: Season 14 Codas [13]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Pining, spn 14x18 promo, you're dead to me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-07
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2020-01-06 07:45:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18384044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whichstiel/pseuds/whichstiel
Summary: "You're dead to me," Dean shouts and it's probably the end.





	Trenchcoat Angel

Sure, Dean thinks about Cas sometimes. When they’re criss-crossing the country, billboards and buildings work like landmarks of memory, and bring back Castiel’s dry and affectionate commentary from the back seat. All the little human absurdities seemed to delight him. Back then.

Dean thinks about him when Sam is hurt. When he’s stitching up his brother, needle passing in and out, in and out. When the hunts get hard. When the green hunters they team up with fumble their badges. He thinks about him.

Dean thinks about him in the morning, when the bunker is cold and quiet. When there’s nobody to greet him as he shambles down the empty hallway. When there’s nobody but Sam, anymore.

“There’s another one.” Sam greets him in the morning with this, shoving his laptop towards Dean before he’s even had a sip of coffee. Dean veers for the computer - of course he does. It’s the same forum - the miracle forum.

TRENCHCOAT ANGEL SPOTTED, reads the subject line. Dean skims it; his heart jacks up to an ungodly fast rhythm.

> _“My aunt just posted on Facebook about someone who just walked into the NICU and healed her son’s heart defect. This your guy?”_

There’s a screenshot of the website with a photo. It’s blurry. The subject of the photo is whirling around at the door, one leg out and one in. Tall. Dark hair. Blur of long coat and dark pants.

Dean’s hands curl into fists and he’s suddenly breathing too hard, too fast. “Why the fuck didn’t you wake me up, Sam?”

Sam levels a stern look at him. “We just got back in at two and you were dead on your feet from driving all night, Dean. Besides, he—“

Dean jabs an accusatory finger at him, not even sure what he’s trying to say. “We’re leaving. Now.”

Sam pulls his laptop back towards him with a quiet, “Dean…”

“Fine. I’m leaving then. Be back in a few days.”

Sam rolls his eyes and closes his computer. “At least give me a chance to get my laundry through the dryer. This was four days ago. You really think he’s still there?”

No. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t going to try. Dean’s been chasing the ghost of Castiel around the country for months now. After he’d shouted him away, Cas had left. He’d switched off the location services on his phone but kept it on - probably for Jack. At least when it rang and rang, Dean could make a good guess that Cas was still alive.

One day they’d returned from a case and there was a note on the table, weighted down by Cas’s cell phone. “I took care of Jack,” the note read. “You don’t have to worry. I’m sorry.” The archangel box was gone, the bunker sealed back up tight.

Five months later the internet started giving up Castiel’s secrets. Dean had hoped he would return eventually, apologetically letting himself back into the bunker with a quiet, “Hello, Dean.” Instead, Castiel had begun to travel. He didn’t seem to be hunting. Dean was almost out of the habit of expecting to find Castiel already working one of their cases, flashing an old FBI badge and a frown. Mentions of a trenchcoat-wearing miracle worker started to crop up on health forums. Cas was healing people.

Dean drives to Missoula, heart in his throat and music turned up too loud. He wonders about Cas. When he’d tracked down Anael, she’d mused that Castiel had at last learned her own lesson and was healing for money, determined to make a new life for himself. Dean thinks he’s just marking time. He’s almost sure he’ll come back.

They arrive in Missoula just after a summer rainstorm has passed and everything seems greener and more vibrant than real life should be. The mountains are slate gray and blue-white over the valley and the cloud cover dissipates with all the magical haste of a mountain-born storm. Dean and Sam work the case that is not quite a case. The forum-poster, a teen whose parents insist on supervising the interview, knows nothing more than rumor. The aunt looks exhausted in the way of new mothers, but she holds a healthy baby in her arms and cries when she talks about Castiel.

The trail is cold again, which is why it takes him three whole minutes to process what his eyes are seeing while he’s eating lunch in a little dive on the edge of town. It’s Cas, striding towards an unremarkable brown truck. The truck is new to Dean, with new plates. Like Cas was trying to hide from them, almost. Dean swears and cracks his hip against the table when he stands to sprint outside. By the time he makes it past the gauntlet of families and tray-laden servers to burst outside, Cas is in his truck with the engine roaring.

“Cas!” he shouts and Castiel actually turns in his seat. His eyes widen and Dean thinks wildly,  _He sees me._ And then his stomach drops because yes, Cas did see him. And that’s his truck peeling out of its parking space and rattling out of sight.

Dean picks a direction to drive while Sam balances his laptop on one knee in the passenger seat and frantically tries to hack the local traffic cameras. The trail goes cold. A week later, Dean finds a report of the truck, abandoned on the side of the road. When he claims ownership to a bored lot attendant, Dean searches it for clues. There’s a trench coat folded on the seat. Otherwise, the cab is close-to-godliness clean.

Sure, Dean thinks about Cas sometimes. As the months stretch to years and the hunts never cease, Dean thinks about him. He thinks about sunsets and nights under the wheeling galaxy of stars. He thinks about the stretch of the sky, vast and beautiful, and how he once was best friends with an angel and how love and misery never fade. They only crystallize into a tangible rock in the gut and lump in the throat that he can carry with him forever. Never easy, but also never lost.

 

#

You’d think it’d be too late. When you’re young, you think new beginnings only happen to the young. After a certain point, people must just give up and wait for the inevitable end. 

Dean turns fifty in a few months and he can still swing a machete hard enough to slice off a head. He can hack a phone in under an hour and polish off a pie slice in three minutes. He’s been told the gray at his temples only add to his charm. The thing is, the the way he feels at fifty is nowhere even close to how he expected to feel. 

It’s why when he runs into Cas randomly in the middle of a case, hope wells in him like no time at all has passed. 

He sees him in Chicago, striding down the sidewalk like he’s on his way to smite a host of demons. Cas is wearing a sweater and jeans and dirt-streaked sneakers, and Dean would notice him anywhere.

Dean supposes that fate’s looking out for him because he’s not driving the Impala, so Cas doesn’t realize he’s sharing a sidewalk with Dean until it’s too late. Dean’s been walking the street, trying to track down a couple of homeless people who might have witnessed their latest monster. Because of that, his eyes are sharp and once he spots Castiel, he waits until he’s close to call out.

“Cas? Cas!” 

Cas spots him too late to flee. Dean’s too close and he has no choice but to acknowledge him. He looks wary and Dean dies a little knowing he brought that look to his face. The crystal lump of agony settles low in his gut.

Castiel stops. Waits for Dean.

Dean meets Castiel under an unlit neon sign and the rose-flush of the sunset creeps between the canyons of buildings and lights him up golden. “I’m sorry,” Dean says. “I missed you.” And even though it’s been years and the distance between them unfathomable, he tells him he loves him.

And it isn’t too late.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Woke up and needed to write something sad for Tumblr but I regretted it INSTANTLY and wrote a happier ending. Turns out all I needed was breakfast.
> 
> Thanks for reading! I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/whichstiel) and [Tumblr](http://whichstiel.tumblr.com/) @ whichstiel. You may also like the Supernatural recap and gif blog I co-write/curate, [Shirtless Sammy](https://shirtlesssammy.tumblr.com/).


End file.
